Duke Head Coach Joanne P. McCallieOpening Statement:
“It was just a great defensive game for us. Two halves of great defense. A lot of hustle, some very very good rebounding. We’re trying to work towards what we’re trying to get to if that makes any sense. When we have three players with 11 rebounds that’s the general idea – trying to be aggressive from all spots. I thought Haley [Peters] and Elizabeth [Williams] were tremendous because they played a lot of minutes. They really, with Allison [Vernerey] out, couldn’t get into foul trouble. They were able to be aggressive and do what they do throughout which I thought was great. And then Ka’lia [Johnson] was just huge. To have her give us what she had and almost get a double-double there and be so explosive on the boards. That changes our team when Ka’lia can do that. That’s kind of what we’re working on is figuring out who can do what and how much everybody can give. It was a good overall game.”

On Chloe Wells coming off the bench:
“I am fantastically happy, we all are for Chloe. She keeps up this rate – 14 minutes and eight points she’s really going to be a star. She was very efficient in her scoring and her ball handling. It’s great to have ball handlers out there. It’s an important part of the game and she just was terrific off the bench. I know we’re all happy about it and she’s been working a long time for this so it was great. And I was mad about all that foul trouble by the way, both [Alexis Jones] and [Chelsea Gray]. Better them than the post tonight.”

On playing an ACC game this early:
“It’s just a great game. I really liked the Cal and Georgia Tech together. If you look at the strengths and what Cal was like and what we were able to learn from that game and then now this game and then heading into St. John’s. It works out well for us, the athletic physical teams. We really wanted to be pressed. For a while there we stalled on the press, but then we got back into it again in terms of attacking it and that’s important.”

On Chelsea Gray leading the run after Georgia Tech’s run to begin the second half:
“That’s just not a good thing to come out of the locker room. I don’t know about that now, why that occurred. But I will say the response was excellent and Chelsea’s leadership and things of that nature. But you’ve got to pour it on. It’s hard to play 40 minutes and we certainly didn’t completely do that tonight. But we learned from that and what I thought was key was getting through that and moving forward and Chelsea was a huge part of that no doubt.”

On maintaining physically during this part of the season with these physical games:
“I think we’re doing really well. We’re getting stronger as we go and we only have one more game until we have a break and we need to make the most of this game relative to how much we can put into it. Because then we’ve got finals and everything else shaking out. But I’ve liked our progress very much and I think our team has done a great job getting themselves ready. So I feel really good about it. Adding Chloe [Wells] back, Richa [Jackson] soon I hope and Allison [Vernerey] will be back for Sunday so I think we’re getting stronger as we go.”

On Georgia Tech’s Tyaaunna Marshall:
“She’s a great player. I guess we didn’t really prepare very well, she had a great game. But we did prepare. We were trying hard, but she really hurt us sliding in gaps and baseline out of bounds. She hurt us in a lot of different ways, not just scoring in their offense. She’s a very very good player and that’s a challenge. I think we disrupted her. We were aware of her, but that fadeaway she has is pretty brutal. It’s hard to contest it. So I give her a lot of credit for developing that in her game. I would say we didn’t do a great job on her. It’s a good job. We did a good job on everybody else for the most part and that’s something we’ll take from that and learn from that a little bit.”

Duke Forward Haley PetersOn her second career double-double:
“It kinda stinks that it’s only my second one but it feels good. I should be getting more of those this year.”

On the physical aspect of the game:
“It didn’t feel that much different than Cal to me but maybe I just didn’t notice it. I think the good thing for us is that we did a lot of the initiating, bumping cutters, bumping number 15, coming through the lane, things like that. They crashed the boards really hard. Those guards were coming in there and they didn’t care if they were going to run you over so I don’t think we did a great job of handling that. But, it’s an ACC game, it’s physical.”

On the team’s potential:
“I think we’ve all known for a while that the sky is the limit for our team. There have been times on the court, it’s probably not good for me to say this but, I will just watch what Chelsea does, what Trish does, what Lex [Alexis] does because it is so fun to see how good we all are together. It felt like one of those games where, I mean, we had 16 assists but 19 turnovers, but it felt like we were making plays together as a group and that we were all on the same page with a lot of stuff. I think defensively too, our presses were good and it felt good. It’s fun to watch our team play.”

Duke Guard Ka'lia JohnsonOn her contributions tonight:
“I just try to come off the bench and bring energy. We were missing Allison and I felt like I had the opportunity to get in there and rebound and make up for some of those rebounds that she usually has for us and it was great energy. I just want to bring that off the bench.”

Duke Forward Elizabeth WilliamsOn being back full-time:
“It feels really good. I’m feeling good. It was nice to play well and it was nice to see everyone around me play well. It was nice to KJ [Ka’lia Johnson] come off with a lot of energy and Haley and I were talking about who is going to get more rebounds and it was nice to try and dominate in the post today.”

On the lack of defensive double-team:
“I guess it is a little surprising because I’ve seen so many different defenses that have the double-team but at the same time we work on just getting the ball out, making good passes, making smart plays so that is what I tried to do.”

Georgia Tech Head Coach MaChelle JosephOpening Statement:
“I think you saw today why Duke is the No. 1 team right now in the ACC and one of the top teams in the country. They have so many weapons. They’re so balanced offensively. They can do so many different things on the offensive end of the floor. I was just really proud of my team. We’re very young. We’ve got a really tough schedule. We just played three top-15 teams back-to-back-to-back and it’s only December. So it’s one of those things where I’m not sure we’re going to see anything tougher than what we’ve seen the past week throughout the course of the season. Even in the ACC, there’s not going to be a stretch where we play three top-15 teams in a row, two on the road. We’re growing, we’re learning. I was proud of the fact that we made a run and cut it to 10 in the second half. A lot of teams would lay down at that point. I’ve had teams come in here in the past that have laid down at that point. But the team today did not lay down. I think you saw why Tyaunna Marshall is one of the top five players in the ACC. She came and she was relentless on both ends of the floor. She’s playing multiple positions. We just didn’t have an answer for [Duke’s] Elizabeth Williams.”

On what her team can improve to compete in the ACC:
“One of the things we’ve got to do – and I’m not talking about tonight, but overall – we’ve really worked on fouling less. I think we’ve done a much better job over the last two games of fouling less. We lost two of those games because we fouled too much. We got beat by Syracuse because they made 27 free throws and we lost by two points. It’s one of those things where it’s the little things. And with a young team, you’re going to see that – they’re going to foul too much early in the season. But we’ve gotten better. We came in here and kept it under 25 [fouls] – that’s improvement for us. It’s the little things. We’re really close. We’re really one loss off of where we were a year ago. People have forgotten that because we’ve lost three in a row. We’re going to be fine. I keep telling me team that – I’m not worried. I think when January or February rolls around, people are going to sit here and say, ‘Is that still the same Georgia Tech team we saw in December?’ because these kids are so young, they’re just learning. We do have some different players. We had Nariah Taylor who was out tonight with an injury. She’ll be back for our next game. It’s just one of those things where we had to rest her for an injury. But injuries are part of the game. Like I said, I like this team. I think Dawnn Maye makes some more shots, we make some more three’s, we put ourself into a better position.”

On whether her team was rushed offensively as a result of Duke’s defensive pressure:
“I think it was a function of the freshmen, it being their first time in this building and playing in an ACC game … It’s only their eighth game. I hope that by February when they have 18, 16 games under their belt, it will be a different story. They didn’t make shots tonight, our freshmen. It puts a lot on Dawn and Ty. We’ve just got to find a third scorer … You’ve got to have three scorers in this league. We’ve proven that in the past – we’ve had offensive balance with inside and outside scoring and we just don’t have that right now. So that’s one of the things we’re really working on.”

Georgia Tech Guard Tyaunna MarshallOn what the team can learn from a tough stretch of games:
“Just learn how to stay together. Finally, I think we’re playing together as one collective unit so I feel like it’s going to get better. At the end of the season, it’s going to say we lost three games, but when I think about my freshman year, we also lost three games and we bounced back and had a great season. We’re going to learn from this and get ready for the rest of our season.”

On going up against Duke’s defense:
“Their defense is a good defense. I think we just had some careless turnovers. I think that was our biggest problem.”